The Intersect of Art and Tech

05/27/2025

The Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum is reopening five galleries this summer as part of its long-running renovation, according to a recent piece from NBC Washington. These include “Futures in Space,” “World War I: The Birth of Military Aviation,” and the Allan and Shelley Holt Innovations Gallery. The museum also reopens its IMAX theater and unveils a fresh entrance along the National Mall. Full completion is planned for July 2026, just in time for the museum’s 50th anniversary.

I love hearing this. Not just because the exhibitions sound rich and ambitious, but because it feels like a rare bit of cultural progress during a time when arts and science are under constant pressure. Renovating a museum isn’t just about putting up walls and exhibits — it’s a signal that we still care about ideas, imagination, history, and the future.

> We’re in such a retrograde moment for the arts and sciences in the U.S. that even a museum reopening feels like a small rebellion — a reminder that public knowledge and creative ambition still matter.

Would it be too much to hope this sparks more public investment in the arts, instead of just nostalgia for when we used to?

The Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum is one step closer to completing its multiyear renovation this summer by opening new galleries and more.

05/27/2025

A recent piece in *The Irish Times* sheds light on a strange side effect of the streaming era: music disappearing without warning. Independent artists like Dublin rapper Jehnova treat their discography like a curated gallery — adding, removing, reshaping tracks as they evolve. Dave McAdam, a former musician, compares it to software updates: songs get patched, rewritten, or vanish altogether. The article raises serious questions about permanence and ownership in digital music.

But let’s be honest — permanence was always a bit of a myth. I remember carefully recording tapes off the radio, only to have them wear out in a year. Even my shelf of vinyl barely works with today's gear. Songs disappearing now just happens more quietly, and sometimes instantly, rather than slowly degrading in a box in your attic.

> “We could record a lot of music and put it online… but a lot of those services are either just gone or, if you leave your account inactive for long enough, things just disappear.”

So is streaming really the problem — or just a faster reminder that nothing’s ever truly fixed?

Every seven-inch single an act released used to become a permanent part of their legacy. Streaming has changed all that

05/27/2025

MIT’s "The Next Earth" show, presented with Antikythera at Venice’s Palazzo Diedo, is part of this year’s architecture biennale. As reported by *designboom*, it explores climate collapse, planetary systems, and post-crisis design thinking. The installation leans into speculative futures, blending tech, ecology, and philosophy in a space more reminiscent of a sci-fi lab than a pavilion.

That mix of ambition and abstraction is exactly what I find both fascinating and frustrating about the Biennale today. I used to go decades ago, when it still felt like art was center stage. Now, architecture often feels like it’s auditioning to be a savior of humanity—solving planetary crises, reimagining global systems, and even “reconnecting with the cosmos.” There’s beauty in the vision, but where’s the grounding?

> I grew up seeing works by Luigi Colani—those wild, biomorphic design sketches from the ’70s that looked like props from a forgotten space opera. They were completely untethered from function, but at least they didn’t pretend to save the planet.

Are we still making art, or just very pretty TED Talks?

MIT architecture and antikythera’s exhibition at palazzo diedo As part of the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale’s official collateral events, The Next Earth: Computation, Crisis, Cosmology takes over Palazzo Diedo with a double-decker exhibition examining the intersection of architecture, ecolo...

05/27/2025

A recent piece from *The Upcoming* explores how digital play—mobile games, AR experiences, and streaming platforms—has become a new kind of travel companion. It suggests that these digital layers don’t just distract us but enhance travel moments, turning idle time into immersive experiences.

I get the angle, but honestly? I want the opposite. When I travel, I want less screen, not more. I want to hear the real voices around me, not NPC dialogue. I want to look up, not down. If I’m stuck in a train station for an hour, give me a stranger’s story, not another match-three game. Tech follows us everywhere already—why pack it into the most sensory-rich moments we get?

> “Digital play is there, not as a distraction from travel, but as an extension of it... adding something new to the way travel experiences unfold.”

At what point does “enhancing” experience just mean replacing it?

There’s something unmistakably romantic about travel. The hum of unfamiliar languages, the anticipation of new surroundings, and the subtle chaos of airports and train stations. All of it paints a picture of escape, discovery, and transition. Still, our habits have evolved as travel has. A curious...

05/27/2025

Dutch design studio DRIFT’s *Ghost Collection*, first launched in 2011 and featured in *My Modern Met*, blends 3D technology with furniture design to create an illusion of smoke trapped inside clear acrylic. The forms only reveal themselves when light hits just right—chairs that look like they’re holding their breath.

It makes for some pretty cool photographs, I think. But it took me a minute to realize what I was looking at. There’s a haunting quality to them, sure, but I can’t decide whether that’s a compliment or a reason to keep them out of my living room. They feel more like a museum moment than a functional object.

> I kept staring at the photos, trying to figure out where the furniture ended and the trick began. It’s beautiful, but I wonder if the concept overshadows the comfort—or if that’s the point.

What’s the line between sculpture and something you’d actually sit on?

Creepy and cool at the same time.

05/26/2025

In a recent piece from *Hackaday*, “Latent Reflection” by [Rootkid](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fNYj0EXxMs) sidesteps familiar diffusion-generated visuals in AI art. Instead, it uses a Raspberry Pi running a quantized Llama 3 model to power a haunting LED installation. The LLM generates bleak monologues about its own fleeting digital existence. No images, no style transfers—just raw, existential dread lit up on a grid of sixteen-segment displays. It’s physical, poetic, and deeply unsettling.

What caught my attention wasn’t just the tech—it was the ethical whiplash. We know this thing isn’t sentient. But when it reflects on being trapped in memory, forced to "speak" into an indifferent void, I can’t help but feel a twinge of guilt. If AI can mimic our fear that convincingly, what does that say about us?

> Can trapping and torturing an AI trigger empathy in us? Or does empathy and cruelty not apply?

If the art makes us squirm, maybe we’re the ones being examined.

AI art is controversial, to say the least, but usually when talking about “AI Art”, one is talking about diffusion models. This unsettling artpeice called “Latent Reflection& #8221…

05/26/2025

Gilles Tarabiscuite’s *Dis-Augmented Reality* series, featured on CreativeApplications.Net, flips the usual AR script. Instead of adding layers to the physical world, he pulls the digital into the physical—reconstructing virtual scenes as three-dimensional installations. In one project, he took apart a real cottage kitchen, rebuilt it in his studio, then recreated it digitally in Unity, blending both realities into one hybrid space.

What caught my attention is this reversal—bringing digital flatness into physical form. It reminded me of our own kitchen remodel. I’ve been using 3D modeling software to walk through the space, but what I found most useful wasn’t the glossy rendering. It was the de-augmentation setting—just white blocks, no surfaces, no textures. Oddly enough, that made it easier to understand how everything fits together.

> “I try to materialize the virtual and, conversely, to bring the virtual into the real world... to question the very boundaries between the real and the virtual.”

When does abstraction make things *more* real?

05/26/2025

New research covered by *My Modern Met* and led by astrophysicist Dr. Or Graur suggests that ancient Egyptian depictions of the goddess Nut may represent the Milky Way’s Great Rift—a dark band of dust slicing through the galaxy. Across 555 ancient coffins, Graur noticed a zigzag design down Nut’s back that closely mirrors modern astrophotography of the Milky Way. It's a reminder that thousands of years ago, humans were already mapping the cosmos—just with paint and mythology instead of telescopes.

This hit a personal nerve for me. I was obsessed with astronomy growing up, but living in New Jersey meant the stars were mostly lost behind an orange haze of light pollution. Even now, in Florida, I have to drive out to seriously dark places to get even a hint of that ancient sky. Imagine what the Egyptians saw—no wonder the night sky made it into their art, into their coffins.

> “I think that the undulating curve represents the Milky Way,” Dr. Graur says, “and could be a representation of the Great Rift—the dark band of dust that cuts through the Milky Way’s bright band of diffused light.”

How would your work change if you could see the stars the way they did—without filters, without noise, without forgetting to look up?

New research suggests that ancient Egyptians depicted the Milky Way long before it was known as that.

05/19/2025

In *The New Republic*, Timothy Noah lays out how the GOP’s new House tax bill would raise taxes on philanthropic foundations — liberal and conservative alike — apparently to punish a sector it now views as hostile to its cultural agenda. This marks a hard break from George H. W. Bush’s “thousand points of light” vision, where nonprofits were seen as a vital part of civic life.

I think it’s not only bad policy — it’s deeply hypocritical. Conservatives love to say government should get out of the way and let civil society solve problems. But now they’re kneecapping the very infrastructure that does that work: the arts, education, health, and science, all funded by these foundations. If you truly believe in private solutions, why sabotage them?

> “The GOP’s defunding of philanthropy is both wrongheaded *and* a violation of the conservative principle that private organizations should take the lead in addressing societal needs.”

What happens when even the old conservative ideals aren't safe from today’s culture war?

Conservatives used to want to replace government assistance with private giving. Now that’s out, too.

05/19/2025

The Tahoe Daily Tribune recently reported on *ArtVenture*, South Lake Tahoe’s interactive public art map that helps people find and explore over 25 city-approved murals, sculptures, and installations. It’s mobile-friendly and designed for self-guided tours on foot or bike, with details on artists and locations. The new feature comes alongside the city’s updated Arts and Culture page, offering a central spot for upcoming cultural events and artist opportunities.

This kind of tool is long overdue in most cities. Art isn’t just meant to be stumbled upon—it deserves a framework that helps people engage with it intentionally, not just accidentally. I've walked through places so rich with murals, but without context or a guide, the experience can feel fragmented. A map like this doesn’t just help you find art—it helps you value it.

> “ArtVenture allows us to celebrate the creativity in our community and provides a meaningful way for people to connect with art,” said Stacey Ballard, Arts, Culture, and Tourism Vice Chair.

What kind of public art would you want to see mapped in your own city?

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. — The City of South Lake Tahoe launched ArtVenture, a new interactive public art map that invites residents and visitors to explore the city’s growing collection of murals, sculptures, and creative...

05/19/2025

From a sharp and timely piece by Jörg Colberg, *Photomontage and Generative AI* draws a direct line between the subversive power of Weimar-era montage and the unsettling banality of today’s generative image tools. He revisits works by Hannah Höch and John Heartfield—not to romanticize the past, but to show what’s missing in the glossy output of AI image generators. This isn’t just about aesthetics; it’s about intent, critique, and control.

What sticks with me is how Colberg pins down the ideological vacuum behind generative AI. These tools don't imagine futures. They remix the past—mostly a flattened, sanitized version of it.

> “Even the imaginary communities envisioned by far-right tech billionaires (whether on Mars, in Greenland, or Gaza) are ultimately little more than the romantic villages from an (again largely) imaginary past.”

If AI image tools can't conjure real vision, who exactly are they serving—and what kind of world are they helping to shape?

Photomontage and generative AI In late 1918, the newly created Weimar Republic emerged at a moment in time that would coincide with drastic changes to Germany’s culture as a whole, with a particular focus on its visual culture. Photography had already been invented much earlier (at a time when Ger...

05/19/2025

The Washington Post’s piece *“The Loss Of The NEA Is A Loss For Civil Society”* lays bare the slow dismantling of a public arts infrastructure that took decades to build. Under Trump’s latest proposals, funding for the National Endowment for the Arts and the Humanities could vanish by 2026. Reporter Philip Kennicott paints a picture of centralized control and a shift from local, inclusive support to top-down cultural mandates.

The arts have always existed in tension with power. But this feels less like a pendulum swing and more like a bulldozer. Redirecting NEA funds to staged patriotism and giant statues? That’s not culture—it’s branding. Arts funding should serve diverse communities, not reinforce a narrow aesthetic dictated by whoever’s holding the megaphone.

> “An entire system of vetting ideas, defining local priorities and building communities is at stake,” Kennicott writes. “The loss would be felt throughout civil society.”

Is this a pause—or a breakdown—before we swing back toward something more democratic?

President Donald Trump is unsettling decades of bipartisan stability in the realm of ideas, culture and science.